Ravensburger, the creator of board games such as Disney/Star Wars/Marvel Villainous, Scotland Yard, and Labyrinth entered the Trading Card Game market last year with its release of Lorcana back in August of 2023. Since then, four sets have been released with a fifth set planned for release in August 2024. When Lorcana’s second set, Rise of the Floodborn, was released in November of 2023, so too was Bucky-Squirrel Squeak Tutor who was almost immediately put into Emerald/Steel Discard. While Bucky’s stats were very good for an uncommon, the card got even better when Lorcana’s fourth set, Ursula’s Return was released in May of this year.
Emerald/Steel Discard Play Pattern
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Emerald/Steel Discard is a deck that prefers to disrupt what its opponent is trying to do rather than advance its own game plan. It’s also a fairly low-ink deck with Tinker Bell-Giant Fairy, Beast-Tragic Hero, and Robin Hood-Champion of Sherwood being the most expensive cards in the deck, with Tinker Bell costing six ink and both Beast and Robin Hood costing five. That’s not taking into account the Shift ability which lets them be played for cheaper.
The way the deck plays is an Emerald/Steel player will typically mulligan till they have a Bucky in hand along with a one-cost Diablo and/or one-cost Robin Hood. They’d then set up by playing with a turn one play, turn two Bucky or Ursula, and if possible a turn three Ursula-Deceiver of All. If they have a Diablo-Devoted Herald in hand, they’d more than likely shift it on their one-cost Diablo on turn two triggering Bucky’s discard ability. The deck also had both mass and spot removal to back up the discard plan.
How Bucky Operated In The Deck
Emerald/Steel Discard has been good since Bucky was released in set two but the release of sets three and four is what really drove the deck to tier-one status. Bucky itself is the centerpiece of the deck and the card having Ward means it can’t be targeted by opponents which is exactly like Hexproof in Magic. It also only costs two ink to play which meant playing it on curve was pretty much guaranteed if in hand.
The way Bucky works is whenever the Emerald/Steel player plays a Floodborn character their opponent has to discard a card from their hand. On top of that, whenever Ursula-Deceiver of All sings a song card, it allows the Emerald/S player to play it again from their discard pile for free meaning cards like We Don’t Talk About Bruno and Sudden Chill get to be played twice thereby causing an opponent to have to discard two cards rather than one.
While Bucky could quest for one lore, Emerald/Steel players would never quest with him because that meant he could be challenged and taken out by higher-power creatures. Instead, players would hardly if ever exert Bucky during a match letting him be protected by Ward the entire game. Ruby and Steel decks had the mass removal and Ruby also had sacrifice cards to get around Ward but good luck casting them when your hand started getting shredded. On top of all that, Prince John-Greediest of All allowed you to draw a card whenever your opponent discarded a card. It’s clear Bucky was a problem card and something needed to be done about it.
Errata Vs. Ban
Seeing how well E/S Discard has been doing since the release of set four, Ravensburger decided to errata Bucky a few days ago. The errata makes him cost three ink, removes Ward, and also alters the ability so now Floodborn characters have to be Shifted to trigger Bucky’s ability. While many players agreed something needed to happen, many also agreed an errata was the wrong way to go about it. While the errata doesn’t go into effect till August 9th, it means reading the card doesn’t explain the card now. Instead, players will need to remember what the errata does instead of acting off the information presented on the card itself.
Many players myself included think they should have just banned Bucky outright. If a card needs to be changed that heavily to make it fair, it might as well just be banned. Instead of making players remember what the errata does, just rip the band-aid off and ban it. Sure, it sucks having a good card get banned, especially one you like playing with but the health of the game is important, and Bucky wasn’t healthy for the game.
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